By Julie Tomascik

Cockroach milk? Yup. You read that right.

Don’t look now, but it could be coming to a grocery store near you.

Because a professor at the University of Iowa, Barbara Stay, discovered that the female Pacific beetle cockroach is unlike any other insect species. She feeds her young “milk.” A pale, yellow liquid in the brood sack. Later in the embryo’s development, the liquid transforms into crystals.

And get this. Stay found that she could essentially milk a cockroach—in liquid or crystal form.

How’d you like to pour a glass of cockroach milk? Mix it into your coffee? Or splash it onto your cereal?

No thanks. I’ll pass on this one.

Surprisingly, they say it’s nutritious. Safe for human consumption? Well, they’re not quite sure about that yet.

But even so, it could be another competitor in a heavy-laden milk market. It’s new, and that makes it hip. And maybe another possible fad? The problem, I think, is marketing.

Wonder what it would take to get FDA approval? Would there be backlash from insect rights activists? Would everyone have a cockroach farm in their apartment? Could you find anyone to milk them or would there be an automated system?

The possibilities, and problems, seem endless.

For now, I’ll stick to milk from a cow. It’s downright dairy good and nutritious to boot. All cow’s milk—whole, lowfat and 2%–contain the same 9 essential nutrients. Like calcium, potassium, protein and more.

That isn’t a fad. It won’t fade away with the next health craze. Milk has done bodies good and put smiles on faces for generations.

But roach milk? Well, I see that turning sour before it gets a chance to become the next big thing.